The future of water consultation report

Newly erratic extremes of weather in the UK, combined with rising populations and growth in industry and agriculture, require us to develop new strategies to guarantee our water supply in the near future. We need to implement a package of many overlapping, partial solutions, including some innovative changes. Recommendations include:  improved communications between stakeholders; shared, consistent, professional, balanced messages across the industry; better connections between water companies; good communications by water companies and other bodies to and with the public about water  reform of the abstraction regime; controlled abstraction to make best use of supply  new ways to determine and communicate water levels and drought status  more efficient water use overall, through, for example, appropriate metering, dynamic tariffs, price review, and grey-water systems  expanded water storage facilities, including distributed small-scale storage  new engineering and technological solutions; encourage broader uptake of existing inexpensive technologies, and better leveraging of old technology  novel funding models such as voluntary and community enterprise schemes, local partnerships, and pension-fund investment in water infrastructure  incentivising reductions in pollution  water footprint advertised on food packaging (and other products?)  reductions in UK’s consumption of embedded water, especially from water-short areas We need a National Water Plan and a national coordinating body to help develop longer-term thinking, good communications, and programmes of activities to take such recommendations forward for future water security in the UK.